68 Putin's Cossacks

68 PUTIN’S COSSACKS JUST FOLKLORE – OR BUSINESS AND POLITICS? Jolanta Darczewska NUMBER 68 WARSAW DECember 2017 PUTIN’S COSSACKS JusT FOLKLOre – OR busIness anD POLITICS? Jolanta Darczewska © Copyright by Ośrodek Studiów Wschodnich im. Marka Karpia / Centre for Eastern Studies Content editor Adam Eberhardt Editor Anna Łabuszewska Co-operation Halina Kowalczyk, Katarzyna Kazimierska Translation Jim Todd Graphic design PARA-BUCH DTP GroupMedia Photograph on cover Yarlander, shutterstock.com PubLIsher Ośrodek Studiów Wschodnich im. Marka Karpia Centre for Eastern Studies ul. Koszykowa 6a, Warsaw, Poland Phone: + 48 /22/ 525 80 00 Fax: + 48 /22/ 525 80 40 osw.waw.pl ISBN 978-83-65827-17-3 CONTENTS THESES /5 INTRODUCTION /8 PREFACE /11 I. THE CHARACTERISTICS OF COSSACKDOM IN RUSSIA: BASIC CONCEPTS /12 1. The ‘Cossack state’ in modern Russia /12 2. The legal status of Cossackdom: the ‘Cossack state service’ /18 3. The ‘Cossack troops’ /23 4. The ‘Cossack component’ as a subject in education and state policy /31 II. THE INSTITUTIONALISATION OF THE COSSACK QUESTION /43 1. The Kremlin’s strategic objectives /43 2. The institutional system for governing the Cossacks /50 SUMMARY /60 THESES • The rhetoric of social engineering is repeatedly used in the Russian narration on the Cossack nation. This social engineering has been served by historically-rooted slo- gans such as ‘the Cossack state’ and ‘registered Cossacks’. Terms such as ‘the Cossack state service’ and ‘the Cossack component’ are also functionally marked concepts. These appear in different contexts (the patriotic education of children and young people, the so-called civil society of Russia and its allegedly traditional conservative values, the creation of pro-defence attitudes, military reserves, a social factor combating the new threats posed by culture, information, illegal migration, etc.). Such concepts are the product of the Kremlin’s political technology – by shaping the military organisation of society and its con- frontational attitude, it is not so much describing a real- ity as creating one. • The legal status of the modern Russian Cossack nation, which is also referred to as ‘neo-Cossackdom’, situates it within the framework of the ‘third sector’, i.e. non-commercial organisations for the public benefit. This serves to emphasise its ability to organise itself. In fact, the Cossack military associations of today have little to do either with grassroots social initiatives or the non-governmental sectors, not to mention folklore or historical re-enactment associations. Their basic distinguishing features are their control by the Kremlin and the exchange of mutual benefits (they serve the Kremlin in exchange for concessions and contracts). This is the result of the Kremlin’s long-term policy, which has led to the con- 12/2017 version of a spontaneous social movement into a movement controlled from the top down. • The favourable political situation at present (including the concessions the Kremlin has awarded the Cossacks in the POINT OF VIEW 5 field of small businesses) is swelling the ranks of Cossack organisations with officers from the security and defence sectors who are leaving to the reserves (these are the roots of the predominant part of the neo-Cossack elite); radicals who are hungry for publicity and influence; and random individuals who are looking for ways to resolve their fi- nancial problems. This has led to a change in motivation for the neo-Cossacks, especially the younger generation. For them, neo-Cossackdom has opened up a career path, because other options are blocked to them; it offers easier access to education and a stable income. • The Cossacks’ imprecise legal, political and social status allows the Kremlin to assign them to different roles: from paramilitary organisations that are intended to educate young people in the spirit of patriotism and obedience, via volunteer fire departments and forest guards, police reserves preventing crime, combating terrorism, extrem- ism and illegal migration, up to the role of irregular forces in information warfare and the fight against illegal bor- der crossings, civil defence and territorial defence forces. Their permanent incorporation into the security and defence system is guaranteed by their non-hierarchical or- ganisational structure, the subordination of the Cossack troops to the President, as well as their ever-closer ap- proximation to military standards. This is the main mes- sage of the Strategy of policy towards the Russian Cossacks to 2020. • The implementation of this strategy is distinguished by the strongly bureaucratic system for managing the neo- 12/2017 Cossacks’ development, as well as the Putin system’s ina- bility to generate new projects. Those currently being im- plemented under the banner of self-financing are merely replicating the old ones, preserving the pathologies of POINT OF VIEW the Russian political & economic system. The Kremlin is 6 placing the burden of implementing its policy on the re- gional authorities: the ‘self-financing’ of the Cossack organisations mainly consists of them concluding more or less profitable contracts, financed by the regions. • The new wave of Cossack-mania in Russia has coincided with a U-turn by the Kremlin away from its previously declared modernisation of Russia and in the direction of traditionalism, a transition which clearly accelerated after the events on the Maidan in Kiev. The Kremlin’s ally in its Cossack policy is the Orthodox Church, and their plat - form for cooperation is the concept of ‘Orthodox Russian civilisation’, which among other things shapes an attitude of civil obedience. Both the state and the Church have exploited the image of Cossackdom as a ‘free state’, and they present the Cossacks as a model of civil society (which is also an argument for the existence in Russia of a subject society), as well as the bearers of conservative Orthodox values fighting the rot of the West, Islamic fundamental- ism, the ‘fifth column’ and other threats to ‘Russian civilisation’. 12/2017 POINT OF VIEW 7 INTRODUCTION The roots of contemporary Cossack-mania in Russia The Russian Cossacks of today, also known as the neo-Cossacks (неоказачество), is in equal measure a product of a top-down Kremlin policy and a bottom-up nationalist movement. Cossack nationalism is clearly linked to a similar trend dating from the beginning of the 20th century1. This was a random confluence of modernisation in the military sphere, conflict between the centre and the periphery, and tensions in the Russian Empire (Cossacks versus peasants; Cossacks versus non-Russians, the so-called инородцы). Two competing projects of Cossackdom emerged at that time: 1) the ethnic variant, with the emphasis on the ‘Cossack’ nation as a separate ethnos, having the right to autonomy and the development of their own culture; and 2) the imperial variant, depicting the Cossacks as a pillar of the empire and the great Russian people, loyal in their service to the state and its Orthodox values, focused on strengthening Russian statehood. The disintegration of the empire, followed by the ‘de-Cossack- isation’ of the Soviet Union and the deportations under Stalin, completely prevented the Cossacks making any radical demands for many decades, but did not uproot these desires entirely. The need to strengthen the Cossacks’ newly conscious distinctive- ness and ‘ethnicity’ re-emerged at the end of the existence of the Soviet Union, when the Don, Terek and other ‘Republics’ were 12/2017 1 Б. Корниенко, Правый и национализма идеология Дон (1909-1914), Изда- тельство Европейского университета в Санкт-Петербурге, Sankt-Peters- POINT OF VIEW burg 2013. 8 proclaimed, and (in November 1991) the creation of a Union of Cossack Republics of Southern Russia was announced. The Russian state’s first reactions to Cossack separatism were cha- otic, and more symbolic in nature than anything else. In July 1992 the Supreme Council passed a resolution on the rehabilitation of the Cossacks, supplementing an earlier resolution on the rehabilitation of the repressed peoples. Meanwhile, the local govern- ments in southern Russia exploited ethnic tensions, politicising the Cossacks’ efforts to overcome poverty and ‘survive in the hos- tile environment’ of southern Russia (i.e. by stressing their status as the ‘host’, as well as the specific laws concerning land use) in the struggle for material resources and power in the regions. However, the decree which Boris Yeltsin signed in 1995 on a state register of Cossack associations in the Russian Federation testi- fied to the start of a new policy towards the Cossacks: it defined not only the challenge facing the state, but also its strategic objectives. Nevertheless, its implementation was only undertaken after the political changes at the turn of the century. Conditions to change the relationship between the state and the Cossacks became more favourable thanks to the centralisation of power, together with a change of emphasis in the direction of Russian imperial tradition. The idea of a state register of Cossacks took concrete shape in a law on the state service of Russian Cossack- dom, which Vladimir Putin signed in 2005. This law also received a solid ideological foundation: the ethnological aspect of the Cos- sack community was pushed into the background, and its mission of state-building was emphasised. The Cossack associations were brought out of deep-freeze, reinforced with people from outside, and pro-Kremlin activists were placed at their head. However, the policy of ‘statising’ the Cossack community did not abolish the di- 12/2017 visions existing within it. A more radical, though poorly heeded element still calls for the recognition of the Cossacks as a nation, and seeks to restore their autonomy and direct democracy under the rule of the atamans. However, the vast majority of people who declare themselves Cossacks believe that such demands are POINT OF VIEW 9 unrealistic at the present time; they participate in the Kremlin’s projects and political games, counting on the latter to protect the group’s interests.

Load more